Reality Check: Jim Bowden

Former Cincinnati Reds general manager (1992-2003) Jim Bowden hosts a show on the MLB Home Plate station on Sirius XM Radio. Recently, he was discussing Reds Hall of Famer Barry Larkin in the context of current Reds first baseman Joey Votto. Votto gets criticized in some quarters for taking too many walks and not driving in enough runs. Votto's said that his approach at the plate doesn't change when there are runners on base. Some of his critics think he should "expand the zone"--swing at more pitches, basically--when there are runners on base in order to drive them in. Votto swung at 20% of pitches outside the strike zone last year, the lowest percentage in the majors among batters who qualified for the batting title, so there is surely room for expansion. Whether he should or not isn't my point here.

Rather, Bowden said that that's what Barry Larkin did in his career. When he was a leadoff hitter, according to Bowden, Larkin took more walks. When he batted further down the order, he swung at more pitches. But did he really?

It's easy to check this using Baseball Reference, which provides splits for every player, including batting order position. 

• Larkin batted leadoff in 406 games. In those games, he walked in 8.7% of his plate appearances.
• He batted second in 675 games, walking in 9.7% of his plate appearances.
• He batted third in 757 games, walking in 11.6% of his plate appearances.
• He batted in other spots in the order in 342 games, walking in 11.2% of his plate appearances.

So Bowden appears to have it wrong. Larkin walked a lot less frequently at the top of the order than he did elsewhere.

And no, it's not because weak Reds middle-of-the-order hitters resulted in Larkin receiving a lot of intentional walks; the relationship holds up if I exclude intentional passes (8.3% batting first, 9.5% second, 10.6% third, 9.3% elsewhere).

And it's not because he led off a lot as a youngster before he learned the strike zone. In 1988 he batted first in 104 games, the most in his career. He was 24 that year. He walked in 5.4% of his plate appearances batting first, 9.4% batting second, 7.1% batting third. He batted leadoff the second most in his career in 2002, when he was 38. He walked in 8.2% of plate appearances in 58 games batting first, 5.8% in 35 games batting second, but 8.8% in 52 games batting elsewhere. In between, his 1995 MVP season: Walked in 12.8% of plate appearances batting first, 8.0% batting second, 13.4% batting third. 

I really can't find any evidence that Barry Larkin was more selective batting leadoff or more free-swinging further down the order. 

(To be clear, this isn't a knock on Bowden. He's entertaining on the radio, he's dealt closely with hundreds and hundreds of ballplayers, and memory's a tricky thing.)

Things I Didn't Know: AL East

In coming weeks, you will have innumerable opportunities to read previews of the upcoming season. I dug through last year's results and came up with items for each team that you probably won't see in the previews but that I thought were interesting.

I started with the National League (here, here, and here), the AL West, and the AL Central. So this is it.

Boston Red Sox, 97-65: Maybe it's me, but the Red Sox going from worst to first last season didn't get all the fanfare it might've. Probably nobody really believed it was a last place club to start out with. 

What changed? Well, when you score 119 more runs and give up 150 fewer from one season to the next, good things happen. But what caused those improvements? Let me point to two less obvious things. On offense, the team had 153 more walks, almost one per game, going from second-to-last in the AL to second. Only two players on the 2012 team got 40 walks. In 2013, there were eight. That's a lot of baserunners. As for pitching, it was a story of the starters, whose ERA fell from 5.19 in 2012 to 3.70 in 2013, largely because of a lot more strikeouts (18% higher rate of strikeouts per plate appearance) and a lot fewer home runs (21% lower rate per batter). 

Tampa Bay Rays, 92-71: The Rays play their home games at Tropicana Field, a pitchers' park. Even though they had a decent offense last year, as evidenced by their sixth-best OPS in the league in road games, they scored only a league-average 4.3 runs per game. That meant their pitchers had to rely on limited run support. In games in which the offense supplied scored 3-5 runs, the average American League team went 21-18 with a 3.99 ERA. The Rays pitchers flourished, leading the league with a 32-12 record and a 2.77 ERA. The next best team, the Red Sox, had a winning percentage 127 points lower and an ERA 0.62 runs higher when receiving 3-5 runs of support.

New York Yankees, 85-77: As I pointed out in my NL West comment about the Arizona Diamondbacks, a team's performance in games decided by one run is usually unstable. Most teams win about half of such games, and a team that's an outlier, either by winning a lot of them or losing a lot of them, is more typically a beneficiary or victim of luck than anything else. Teams with a great record in one-run games generally do worse in those games the next year, and teams that have a really bad record in one-run games usually improve. The Yankees were 30-16 in one-run games last year, the best record in the American League. They are likely to do worse this year in one-run games, regardless of all the free agents they signed over the winter.

Baltimore Orioles, 85-77: Skeptical about my Yankees comment? Just look at the Orioles. In 2012, somewhat famously, they had a 29-9 record in one-run games, the best in the majors. Some pointed to the team's strong bullpen and winning attitude, while detractors attributed it to luck. The skeptics won out, as last year, the team's one-run record swung to 20-31, the worst in the league. (Actually, the Astros, at 18-36 were worse, but given that their winning percentage in one-run games, .333, was better than their record in other games, .306, you can't really say they were unlucky.) If the O's can split the difference and play .500 ball in one-run games this year, they'll have a better record, if not a better narrative.

Toronto Blue Jays, 74-88: The Jays were probably the most disappointing team in the league last year. After big moves in the offseason to add Jose Reyes, Melky Cabrera, Mark Buehrle, Josh Johnson, and defending NL Cy Young winner R.A. Dickey, they were picked by some to win the division. Instead, they improved by only one game from 2012, finishing in last with a 74-88 record, done in by defense (fourth-most errors in the league), pitching (third-most runs allowed), and injuries. Only the offense, which scored more runs per game (4.40) than average (4.33), was OK.

Except at second base. The worst-hitting position in the American League was Toronto's second base. Blue Jays keystoners managed just a .216/.258/.297 slash line. How bad is that? Three pitchers (minimum 50 plate appearances) had a higher batting average, on base percentage, and slugging percentage.

Ankiel Retires

Rick Ankiel retired yesterday. You may not remember Ankiel, but he was a second-round draft pick by the Cardinals as a high school pitcher in 1997 and appeared briefly in St. Louis in 1999. In 2000, at age 20, the lefty started 30 games for the NL Central champs, going 11-7 with a 3.50 ERA, best on the team, and 194 strikeouts in 175 innings, ranking second in the NL in strikeouts per nine innings. He blew up on the postseason, though. He walked six in 2.2 innings in the first game of the NLDS against the Braves. (The Cards won the game anyway and swept the series.) He failed to make it out of the first inning of the second game of the NLCS against the Mets, throwing just 14 strikes among 33 pitches, while walking three in 2.2 innings. He pitched two thirds of an inning in the fifth and last game of that series, walking another two. His postseason ERA was 15.75 and he walked 11 in four innings. 

That was pretty much it for his pitching career, as he could never find home plate again, in the majors or the minors. His 2004 season raised hopes, as he tore through three levels in the minors (23.2 innings, 0.76 ERA, 23 strikeouts and just two walks) and walked only one in ten innings in the majors during a September callup. But after throwing only three strikes in a 20-pitch appearance in spring training in 2005, he made the surprising decision to give up pitching to become an outfielder. 

He played outfield in the minors in 2005 and 2006 and earned an August callup in 2007. He hit a home run in his first game back and finished the year batting .285/.328/.535 with 11 homers in 172 at-bats. There were more references to The Natural in the national media than you could shake a stick at. The next year he set career highs for plate appearances (463), hits (109), runs (65), homers (25), RBI (71), walks (42), and on base percentage (.337). He wound up playing for six teams in an eleven-year career, hitting 76 home runs--not a bad career for a guy who looked washed up at 21. In the field, he was primarily a center fielder. While a lack of control doomed his pitching career, he retained a powerful arm, as evidenced by the perfect strike he threw here (note the baserunner not budging off third):

(Video from the Baseball Prospectus Effectively Wild podcast Facebook page.)

Alex, I'll Take Inflammable for $80

This morning at the gym, two guys were discussing the word infamous. One said it meant being famous for something bad. The other thought it meant being famous within a small group. (I am not making this up.) I was tempted to chime in, but naturally, the phrase that immediately came to mind was "Don Denkinger's infamous call in the 1985 World Series." I'm sure it did for you, too.

Reality Check: Ruben Amaro

Now that we've got actual baseball games, and actual baseball people talking about other actual baseball people, I'm going to initiate a feature called "Reality Check." I'm going to take things I hear or read and test them, where I can, to see if they're true. This is not going to be a "gotcha" feature. If someone calls something correctly, I'll give credit. I remember last summer hearing Barry Larkin say on Baseball Tonight that the Seattle Mariners hit a lot of home runs. I thought, "Yeah, they pulled the fences in, but still, the Mariners aren't a home run team." Well, there's a reason Larkin does what he does and I do what I do: The Mariners wound up finishing second in the AL in homers, well behind the Orioles but in a tight grouping with Oakland and Toronto that was clearly well ahead of the rest.

Anyway, here goes. Over the weekend I heard an interview of Phillies GM Ruben Amaro on Sirius XM. I was driving, so I couldn't write down his exact quote, but the gist of it was that with free agents A.J. Burnett and Roberto Hernandez joining the club, the Phils have two of the top ground ball pitchers in the game. He said the team (which has been notoriously hostile to statistical analysis), is going to use analytics to shift infielders around to better get all those grounders, as the Pirates did last year.

Burnett first. There were 43 NL starting pitchers who qualified for the ERA title (162 innings pitched). Of them, Burnett got grounders on 56.5% of batted balls, most in the NL. Score one for Amaro. 

Now, Hernandez. He's the guy who used to be called Fausto Carmona. Anyway, he didn't quite qualify for the ERA title with Tampa Bay last year. He pitched 151 innings. Of the 48 AL pitchers with 150+ innings, Hernandez got grounders on 53.2% of batted balls, fifth in the league. Despite all those ground balls, he managed to give up the home runs at the fourth highest rate in the league, as nearly 21% of the fly balls he allowed left the park, the highest proportion in the league. That's crazy high and isn't likely to persist, though the move to Citizens Bank Park won't help much.

Anyway, Ruben was right. By adding Burnett and Hernandez, the Phillies pitchers' ground ball percentage of 44.5% last year, tenth in the league, is going to rise. My concern about the Phillies is whether they'll embrace infield shifts enough to take advantage of all those grounders, and whether their aging infielders (shortstop Jimmy Rollins and second baseman Chase Utley are 35, first baseman Ryan Howard is 34) have the range to get at them.

Things I Didn't Know: AL Central

In coming weeks, you will have innumerable opportunities to read previews of the upcoming season. I dug through last year's results and came up with items for each team that you probably won't see in the previews but that I thought were interesting.

I started with the National League (here, here, and here). Already hit the AL West, so now it's the Central.

Detroit Tigers, 93-69: Want to know why the Tigers were so eager to sign 39-year-old former Rangers closer Joe Nathan to a free agent contract back in December? No team in baseball had a larger differential between ERAs for starters (3.44) and relievers (4.01). For most teams, the bullpen had a lower ERA than the starters. Nathan has a career ERA of 2.14 since joining the AL in 2003.

One more Tigers fun fact: In limited opportunities (i.e., interleague play), Tigers pitchers had a .222/.300/.278 slash line, equal to a .578 OPS. A .578 OPS is better than White Sox catchers, Blue Jays second basemen, and Royals shortstops last year.

Cleveland Indians, 92-70: Cleveland feasted on lefties, going 36-20 against them. Their .643 winning percentage against southpaws was the best in the league. They had problems against righties, compiling just a .528 winning percentage. The .115 differential was the most in the league. It's unusual for a team to do better against lefties than righties (only four AL teams did), and Cleveland was helped by three switch hitters in the lineup. They team was also helped by playing in the same division as the White Sox, against whom the Indians had a 17-2 record, the best head-to-head record in baseball.

Kansas City Royals, 86-76: Royals cleanup hitters (mostly Billy Butler) had 11 home runs and 72 RBI last year. Both the Indians and Red Sox got more homers and RBI from their number 8 hitters. Not a lot of cleaning up in KC last year.

Minnesota Twins, 66-96: OK, I'm calling this series Things I Didn't Know, but I did know this one, as I discussed it in December: Twins relievers had more strikeouts last year than Twins starters. I'm repeating it because it's so crazy. It's never happened before, and as I said, it's not because the Twins relievers are all flamethrowers: their strikeouts per nine innings ranked 23rd among the 30 major league bullpen. It's a reflection about how amazingly bad the Twins starters (their 5.26 ERA was the worst in the majors by almost half a run) were. 

Chicago White Sox, 63-99: When you play in a hitter's park, you wind up with inflated hitting statistics. US Cellular Field is a hitter's park. Yet the White Sox scored only 598 runs last year, the fewest in the American League, and the fewest for the franchise since 1980. Of the players ending the year on Chicago's roster, only first baseman Paul Konerko, DH Adam Dunn, utility infielder Jeff Keppinger, and middle reliever Matt Lindstrom were even born the last time the Sox had fewer than 600 runs scored.

Things I Didn't Know: AL West

In coming weeks, you will have innumerable opportunities to read previews of the upcoming season. I dug through last year's results and came up with items for each team that you probably won't see in the previews but that I thought were interesting.

I started with the National League (here, here, and here). Let's take the American League, west to east.

Oakland Athletics, 96-66: I don't know what to make of this, but something's going on with the A's and fly balls. Roughly speaking, of all batted balls, 45% are ground balls, 20% are line drives, and 35% are fly balls. Every team in the majors hit at least 40% ground balls...except Oakland, which was also the only team to hit more fly balls than ground balls. Same thing with pitching: Every staff in the majors had at least 40% of all batted balls hit on the ground...except Oakland, which was also the only team whose pitchers allowed more fly balls than ground balls. Over the winter, researcher Andrew Koo hypothesized that Oakland GM Billy Beane of Moneyball fame was exploiting a market inefficiency by recruiting fly ball hitters. (Original research here for Baseball Prospectus subscribers, summarized here.) But if it's true that fly ball hitters have an advantage in a game increasingly dominated by ground ball pitchers, what's up with the fly ball pitchers? Beane knows, I don't, and the A's have won the most games in the AL over the past two years, so it's obviously working.


Texas Rangers, 91-72: The most celebrated free-agent signing of last season was Josh Hamilton, who went from the Rangers to the Angels amid a fair amount of bitterness and recriminations. In 2012, the Rangers led the league in center fielder OPS, .870, with Hamilton getting 55% of plate appearances. They also led the league in left fielder OPS, .899. David Murphy was the primary left fielder, but Hamilton got 34% of plate appearances there as well. In 2013, without Hamilton, Rangers center fielders had a .719 OPS, just tenth in the league, and their left fielders were ninth at .722. Hamilton was a disappointment in Anaheim, with a .250/.307/.432 slash line and 21 homers after hitting .285/.354/.577 with 43 bombs in 2012, but his .739 OPS was still better than what the Rangers trotted out at his old positions last year.

Los Angeles Angels, 78-84: The Angels had some weird situational hitting splits. Angels batters advanced 58% of runners on second with no outs, third best in the league. They drove in 54% of runners from third with fewer than two outs, the best in the league. But with runners on first and fewer than two outs, they hit into double plays 13% of the time, the worst in the league. So they were great with runners on second and third but terrible with runners on first.

Seattle Mariners, 71-91: Not a lot went right for the Mariners, but their decision before the season to bring in the fences at Safeco Field worked. In 2012, Mariners batters hit 56 home runs at home, fewest in the league. In 2013 they had 88, the fourth most. Of course, the fences were brought in for the Mariners' opponents too, but the Mariners pitchers went from giving up 60 at home in 2012 to 82 in 2013. They hit 32 more and gave up just 22 more at home. 

Houston Astros, 51-111: When you're looking for fun facts, the Astros are pretty target-rich. Worst record in the majors. Ended the season with a 15-game losing streak. New record for strikeouts in a season. Last in OPS and ERA. But if I had to pick one, it's this: The Astros were winning 56 games after seven innings. They wound up losing 17 of them. That's a .696 winning percentage, the worst in baseball. Just give them a league-average record holding leads after seven and they'd have won eight more games. Their bullpen was last in the league in ERA and last in strikeouts despite pitching the third-most innings.